"Blessed are ye that sow beside all Waters!" A LAY SERMON, ADDRESSED TO THE HIGHER AND MIDDLE CLASSES, ON THE EXISTING Distresses and Discontents. By S. T. COLERIDGE, Esq. Ἐὰν μὴ ἐλπίζητε, ἀνέλπιςον οὐκ ευρήσετε, ἀνεξερεύνητον ὄν καὶ ἄπορον. HERACLITUS apud Theodoret, Vol. iv. p. 716. If ye do not hope, ye will not find: for in despairing ye block up the mine at its mouth! ye extinguish the torch, even when ye are already in the shaft. LONDON: PRINTED FOR GALE AND FENNER, PATERNOSTER ROW; J. HATCHARD, PICCADILLY. GOD AND THE WORLD WE WORSHIP STILL TOGETHER, DRAW NOT OUR LAWS TO HIM, BUT HIS TO OURS ; UNTRUE TO BOTH, SO PROSPEROUS IN NEITHER, THE IMPERFECT WILL BRINGS FORTH BUT BARREN FLOWERS! UNWISE AS ALL DISTRACTED INTERESTS BE, STRANGERS TO GOD, FOOLS IN HUMANITY ; TOO GOOD FOR GREAT THINGS AND TOO GREAT FOR GOOD, WHILE STILL "I DARE NOT" WAITS UPON “I WOU'D!" S. Curtis, Printer, INTRODUCTION. you FELLOW-COUNTRYMEN! You I mean, who fill the higher and middle stations of society! The comforts, perchance the splendors, that surround you, designate your rank, but cannot constitute your moral and personal fitness for it. Be it enough for others to know, that you are its legal-but by what mark shall stand accredited to your own consciences, as its worthy-possessors? Not by common sense or common honesty; for these are equally demanded of all classes, and therefore mere negative qualifications in your rank of life, or characteristic only by the aggravated ignominy consequent on their absence. Not by genius or splendid talent: for these, as being gifts of Nature, are objects of moral interest for those alone, to whom they have been allotted. Nor yet by eminence in learning; for this supposes such a devotion of time and thought, as would in many cases be incompatible with the claims of active life. Erudition is, doubtless, an ornament, that especially beseemnes a high. station: but it is professional rank only that renders its attainment a duty. The mark in question must be so far common, that we may be entitled to look for it in you from the mere circumstance of your situation, and so far distinctive, that it must be such as cannot be expected generally from the inferior classes. Now either there is no such criterion in existence, or the Desideratum is to be found in an habitual consciousness of the ultimate principles, to which your opinions are traceable. The least, that can be demanded of the least favored among you, is an earnest endeavour to walk in the Light of your own knowledge; and not, as the mass of mankind, by laying hold on the skirts of Custom. Blind followers of a blind and capricious guide, forced likewise (though oftener, I fear, by their own improvidence, * than by the lowness of of their estate) to consume Life in the means * A truth, that should not however be said, save in the spirit of charity, and with the palliating reflection, that this very improvidence has hitherto been, though not the inevitable, yet the natural result of Poverty and the Poor Laws. With what gratitude I venerate my country and its laws, my humble publications from the "FEARS IN SOLITUDE” printed in 1798, to the present discourse bear witness. Yet the POOR LAWS and the REVENUE-if I permitted myself to dwell on these exclusively, I should be tempted to fancy that the domestic seals were put in commission and entrusted to Argus, Briareus, and Cacus, as lords of the commonalty. Alas! it is easy to see the evil; but to imagine a remedy is difficult in exact proportion to the experience and good sense of the seeker.. That excellent man, Mr. Perceval, whom I regard as the best and wisest statesman, this country has possessed since the revolution (I judge only from his measures and the reports of his speeches in parliament: for I never saw him, that I know of) went into the ministry, with the design as well as the wish of abolishing lotteries. I was present at a table, when this intention was announced by a venerable relative of the departed statesman, who loved and honored the man, but widely dissented from him as a politician. Except myself, all present were partizans of the opposition; but all avowed their determination on this score alone, as a great moral precedent, to support. the new minister. What was the result? Two lotteries. in the first year instead of one! The door of the cabinet has a quality the most opposite to the Ivory Gate of Virgil, It suffers no dreams to pass through it. Alas! as far |